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[jonts26]

Should we change the name of that subforum to RSPG or relegate grammar to its own subforum? I think the latter would be better as we don't want RSP debates becoming too heated.

[GeoLib]

Can we bring back the "literally" debate. That one was literally an exploding birthday cake of fun.

[popsofctown]

Should we change the name of that subforum to RSPG or relegate grammar to its own subforum? I think the latter would be better as we don't want RSP debates becoming too heated.

English grammar should be a subforum of Dominion rulings, since it is very important under Donald's "no errata ever" system.

[Awaclus]

I'm still not completely used to having different pronouns for males and females, so I use whatever I happen to use. Usually it's he, but if I remember to pay attention, I will use they.

Does Finnish not have gendered pronouns?

It doesn't.

[Kirian]

I'm still not completely used to having different pronouns for males and females, so I use whatever I happen to use. Usually it's he, but if I remember to pay attention, I will use they.

Does Finnish not have gendered pronouns?

It doesn't.

Interesting!  I learned something new today.

[soulnet]

This is actually worse than RSP, this is grammar.

Everything is worse than S. Not a lot is worse than R. P, it is somewhat in the middle I guess.

[theory]

I'm still not completely used to having different pronouns for males and females, so I use whatever I happen to use. Usually it's he, but if I remember to pay attention, I will use they.

Does Finnish not have gendered pronouns?

It doesn't.

Interesting!  I learned something new today.

Chinese uses a bit of a hack -- it has gendered pronouns but they are homonyms (or more technically, maybe polysemes).  So although the problem is present in writing (where it uses the chauvinistic solution), it is not an issue in speech.  And even in writing, the new Internet trend is just to use the phoneticization as the gender-neutral pronoun.

[Awaclus]

Everything is worse than S.

I agree.

[Ozle]

Quite clearly an easy test to determine this, pretty sure I have covered this before:

Are they posting on an internet forum: If Yes, then Male

There are no girls on the internet

[Warfreak2]

"They"/"them"/"their" are acceptable in the meanwhile.

I will use he/she or bend over backwards to avoid using pronouns altogether before I will use they/them/their when referring to a single entity.

Then you are very silly.

Ozle, did anyone even think that joke was funny ten years ago?

[Ozle]

"They"/"them"/"their" are acceptable in the meanwhile.

I will use he/she or bend over backwards to avoid using pronouns altogether before I will use they/them/their when referring to a single entity.

Then you are very silly.

Ozle, did anyone even think that joke was funny ten years ago?

I have no idea, I only found out about this internet thing about 18 months ago. They really should tel more people about it!

[qmech]

"They"/"them"/"their" are acceptable in the meanwhile.

I will use he/she or bend over backwards to avoid using pronouns altogether before I will use they/them/their when referring to a single entity.

Then you are very silly.

Ozle, did anyone even think that joke was funny ten years ago?

I have no idea, I only found out about this internet thing about 18 months ago. They really should tel more people about it!

On the internet, nobody knows he's a dog.

[LastFootnote]

"They"/"them"/"their" are acceptable in the meanwhile.

I will use he/she or bend over backwards to avoid using pronouns altogether before I will use they/them/their when referring to a single entity.

Then you are very silly.

Dude, from what I've read of it, that article is not telling me to stop going out of my way not to use plural pronouns to refer to singular entities. It's telling me not to correct or judge other people when they do use those pronouns that way. I already don't correct or judge people when they do that. Did my post say that "I will use he/she or bend over backwards to avoid using pronouns altogether before I will use they/them/their when referring to a single entity AND IF YOU DON'T, YOU ARE WRONG!?" No, it did not. You're the one correcting me! 

I also don't drink. I don't have any religious reason for this. Nobody in my family is an alcoholic. It's just something I don't generally do. I've had probably less than 20 alcoholic drinks in my 31 years of life, and I've never been drunk. I don't know what I'm like when I'm drunk, but I don't particularly care to find out. Some people assume that because I refuse alcohol, I'm judging them for drinking it. Man, I am not judging you for drinking. Have fun! Do whatever's right for you. I'll keep doing what's right for me.

[florrat]

I also don't drink. I don't have any religious reason for this. Nobody in my family is an alcoholic. It's just something I don't generally do. I've had probably less than 20 alcoholic drinks in my 31 years of life, and I've never been drunk. I don't know what I'm like when I'm drunk, but I don't particularly care to find out. Some people assume that because I refuse alcohol, I'm judging them for drinking it. Man, I am not judging you for drinking. Have fun! Do whatever's right for you. I'll keep doing what's right for me.

Wow, this exactly describes me (if you replace 20 by 2 and 31 by 23). Are you future me?

[Kirian]

I also don't drink. I don't have any religious reason for this. Nobody in my family is an alcoholic. It's just something I don't generally do. I've had probably less than 20 alcoholic drinks in my 31 years of life, and I've never been drunk. I don't know what I'm like when I'm drunk, but I don't particularly care to find out. Some people assume that because I refuse alcohol, I'm judging them for drinking it. Man, I am not judging you for drinking. Have fun! Do whatever's right for you. I'll keep doing what's right for me.

Wow, this exactly describes me (if you replace 20 by 2 and 31 by 23). Are you future me?

Amusingly, this is also me, except with the values "less than one" and 35.

[Ozle]

I also don't drink. I don't have any religious reason for this. Nobody in my family is an alcoholic. It's just something I don't generally do. I've had probably less than 20 alcoholic drinks in my 31 years of life, and I've never been drunk. I don't know what I'm like when I'm drunk, but I don't particularly care to find out. Some people assume that because I refuse alcohol, I'm judging them for drinking it. Man, I am not judging you for drinking. Have fun! Do whatever's right for you. I'll keep doing what's right for me.

Wow, this exactly describes me (if you replace 20 by 2 and 31 by 23). Are you future me?

Wow this also exactly describes me (if you replace the 20 drinks with 'too many to count' and the 'I'm not judging you' with 'I am judging you')

[Grujah]

This is actually worse than RSP, this is grammar.

Everything is worse than S. Not a lot is worse than R. P, it is somewhat in the middle I guess.

Actually, you are playing it wrong.
Paper is indeed worse than Scissors, but Rock crushes it completely.

[eHalcyon]

Can we bring back the "literally" debate. That one was literally an exploding birthday cake of fun.

[mail-mi]

Can we bring back the "literally" debate. That one was literally an exploding birthday cake of fun.

[popsofctown]

"They"/"them"/"their" are acceptable in the meanwhile.

I will use he/she or bend over backwards to avoid using pronouns altogether before I will use they/them/their when referring to a single entity.

Then you are very silly.

Dude, from what I've read of it, that article is not telling me to stop going out of my way not to use plural pronouns to refer to singular entities. It's telling me not to correct or judge other people when they do use those pronouns that way. I already don't correct or judge people when they do that. Did my post say that "I will use he/she or bend over backwards to avoid using pronouns altogether before I will use they/them/their when referring to a single entity AND IF YOU DON'T, YOU ARE WRONG!?" No, it did not. You're the one correcting me! 

I also don't drink. I don't have any religious reason for this. Nobody in my family is an alcoholic. It's just something I don't generally do. I've had probably less than 20 alcoholic drinks in my 31 years of life, and I've never been drunk. I don't know what I'm like when I'm drunk, but I don't particularly care to find out. Some people assume that because I refuse alcohol, I'm judging them for drinking it. Man, I am not judging you for drinking. Have fun! Do whatever's right for you. I'll keep doing what's right for me.

I don't know how LastFootnote even found out about my drinking habits but he is making me uncomfortable with his implied criticisms of my lifestyle

[AJD]

Chinese uses a bit of a hack -- it has gendered pronouns but they are homonyms (or more technically, maybe polysemes).  So although the problem is present in writing (where it uses the chauvinistic solution), it is not an issue in speech.  And even in writing, the new Internet trend is just to use the phoneticization as the gender-neutral pronoun.

To put it another way, Chinese doesn't have gendered pronouns, but the writing system allows you to distinguish gender on pronouns where the language itself doesn't.

[GeoLib]

Chinese uses a bit of a hack -- it has gendered pronouns but they are homonyms (or more technically, maybe polysemes).  So although the problem is present in writing (where it uses the chauvinistic solution), it is not an issue in speech.  And even in writing, the new Internet trend is just to use the phoneticization as the gender-neutral pronoun.

To put it another way, Chinese doesn't have gendered pronouns, but the writing system allows you to distinguish gender on pronouns where the language itself doesn't.

Huh. I remember that you're a linguist. Are you saying that writing systems are not considered by linguists to be part of the language. I never realized that.



Also, Theory, might we get this grammar discussion split into a separate thread?

[theory]

Is it common for languages to have no gendered pronouns whatsoever, like in Finnish?

[Warfreak2]

AND IF YOU DON'T, YOU ARE WRONG!?" No,

Indeed, you aren't "wrong", just silly. There's a big difference - Morecambe and Wise are wrong, and Monty Python are silly.

[Teproc]

Is it common for languages to have no gendered pronouns whatsoever, like in Finnish?

I don't know, but I'd note that Finnish is a very, very weird language. UNlike the overwhelming majority of European langauages, it is not in the Indo-European family (basically the only other European language that isn't is magyar/hungarian). So it could be an outlier. As far as I know, all latin and anglo-saxon languages have gendered pronouns.